


Build a Home

by domesticadventures



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Background Hunting, Eileen is alive because I started writing this before 12x21 and also because I said so, Found Family, Happy Ending, M/M, Miscommunication, Mutual Pining, POV Dean Winchester, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-12-03 06:42:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11526690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/domesticadventures/pseuds/domesticadventures
Summary: After they save the world, Dean expects Cas to come back to the bunker with them.He doesn’t.





	Build a Home

**Author's Note:**

> some brief comments as i finish this absolutely last minute as per usual:
> 
> this fic was written for the [spn canon big bang](https://spncanonbigbang.tumblr.com/)! i had the pleasure of working with [myukur](https://myukur.tumblr.com/) for this challenge, who did the art for this fic and was much more on top of things than i was. her art masterpost is [here](http://myukur.livejournal.com/1251.html)!
> 
> shoutout to [kora](http://beenghosting.tumblr.com/) and [cecilia](http://samshurley.tumblr.com/) for beta reading this at various times, including the day before the posting deadline haha oops.
> 
> hope y'all enjoy it!

The celebration for saving the world is a quiet affair.

They sit in the corner booth of the closest bar they can find, one that’s pretending to be a pub. Mary slides in next to Sam and Cas slides in next to Dean. They order drinks and dinner and then they sit quietly, trading glances across the table, smiling tiredly at one another.

Their drinks arrive a few minutes later and they toast. Sam is the first to raise his glass. He says, “To us.”

“To us,” the rest of them echo, clinking their glasses together.

\--

Mary leaves two drinks in, murmuring about turning in early, about being older than she looks. They laugh, promising to keep in touch as they hug and say their goodbye-for-nows.

Sam spreads out in the booth once she’s gone, leans against the wall with his legs lying across the seat.

“Another round?” Cas asks, eyeing their nearly empty glasses. At Sam’s nod, he moves to stand, knee bumping against Dean’s as he slides out of the booth. Dean watches as he winds between the tables, as he leans easily against the bar and flags down the bartender.

Dean turns back to the last of his beer to find Sam watching him intently. “Something on my face?” he asks as he downs the rest of his drink.

Sam smiles, shakes his head. He says, “Feels good to have another win, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Dean says. “It does.”

Cas comes back with three more glasses held carefully between his hands. He sets them on the table, distributes them -- Sam nods, raises his glass to Cas in thanks -- and then slides back into the booth next to Dean. He leans over to ask Sam a question, shifting in the booth so he’s pressed up against Dean’s side.

Dean is over-warm in the cramped seat. He takes a long drink of his beer, and by the time he sets down his glass, Cas has moved away, back into his own space.

\--

As they stand in the parking lot afterwards, Cas shifts from foot to foot while Dean bounces his keys in his hand. Sam has already slid into the passenger seat and is probably half asleep leaning against the window.

“So, see you at--” Dean starts, at the same time Cas says, “Well, give me a--”

Dean chuckles. He says, “Sorry. You go first.”

Cas smiles at him, half of his mouth quirking up, but there’s a furrow in his brow that hadn’t been there earlier. He says, “Give me a call if you need anything.”

Something in Dean’s chest tightens. “Oh,” he says, pausing to clear his throat. “Yeah. You too, man.”

\--

Dean can’t quite remember the last time he woke up without the looming feeling that the world was about to end.

He picks up his phone and sees no new messages, no missed calls, so he puts it back down and stays in bed for a few more minutes, stretching out across his mattress. Eventually he gets up and takes a long shower, wanders into the kitchen and finds they’re out of damn near everything. He catches sight of Sam sitting hunched over his laptop in the library as he heads out.

“Going to the store,” he says, half-waving as he heads up the stairs. He gets only a distracted “Okay” in response, Sam barely looking up from his computer.

He blasts his music on the way to the grocery store, rolls down the windows, drives with one hand on the wheel and his other arm half out of the car. He walks the aisles and plans meals as he goes, calculating how much he’ll need to feed the two of them, how long the fresh produce will last before he needs to make another trip.

Sam is still in his same spot when Dean gets back, bags hanging off both arms in an effort to get everything in one trip. “No, don’t get up, I’ve got it,” Dean says, earning him a quick glance and a “Sorry” as he makes it to the bottom of the stairs. He rolls his eyes as he moves down the hallway, sets everything on the counters and puts it away. By the time he’s done, though, he doesn’t feel like cooking anything, so he pours himself a bowl of cereal and heads to the library.

He sits across from Sam and opens his laptop, looks for something to do, settles on rewatching _Hot Fuzz._ He half watches as he eats, then sets his bowl to the side, leans on one elbow, idly spins his phone on the table.

Above the sound coming through his headphones, he hears Sam huffing an annoyed sigh.

Dean pulls out one earbud. “Can I help you?” he asks.

“Can you give it a rest?” Sam says. “You’re driving me crazy.”

Dean slips his phone into his pocket and out of sight. “What, am I distracting you from something important?”

“Actually,” Sam says, and looks up at him.

“Christ,” Dean says. “Can’t we have a day to just relax?”

Sam rolls his eyes, but he waves Dean over, angles his laptop so Dean can see the lines and lines of code he has open.

“It’s based on what the Brits had,” Sam says. “Or, well, it will be. I’m just doing the basic coding right now, setting up the algorithms that’ll search for potential hunts, pull from their records--”

Dean raises an eyebrow. “Their records, huh? I suppose they what, just handed those over to you while you were in the know?”

“I may have, uh…” Sam leans back in his chair, scrunches up his face. “...Liberated? Them.”

Dean laughs, pats him on the shoulder. “Atta boy.”

Sam grins. “It’s just in the beginning stages now,” he says, sitting up straight, tabbing between screens. “But I’m hoping to take what they had and build on it, add in some filters.” He taps at the screen, at the pictures of familiar faces in the Men of Letters’ files -- Garth, Alex, Max and Alicia. Cas. “Their program was indiscriminate, and we know how badly that went. So. I’d like ours to have a little more, uh…”

“Non-douchebaggery?”

Sam snorts. “I was going to say ‘empathy,’ but yeah, basically.” He tabs to another screen -- the files he’s been keeping while they’ve been hunting, the knowledge they’ve collected from their own experiences as well as research they’ve pulled from the files in the bunker and digitized. “I wanna add stuff the Brits didn’t have, too. Put in our stuff and add more stuff as we go. Pool knowledge from other hunters, you know? The kind of things that don’t usually get written down. Constantly adapt it, keep it updated.”

“So no more surprise visits from, oh, I dunno, another alpha?”

Sam nods. “Exactly.”

Dean leans on the table, taps his fingers on the surface. “You think we can do it?” he asks. “Build off their system without, you know. Taking after those assholes?”

Sam nods. “We’ll take what we can use and throw out the rest,” he says. “I mean, our system was never perfect, and this won’t be, either. With the size of the U.S. alone...I think we’re always going to have to do things like we have been.”

“What, the hard way?” Dean says.

“Yeah, suppose so,” Sam says, shrugging. “But if we can build on what we’ve got, get some level of organization going? If we can set up at least some level of communication and coordination, if we can direct our resources better...Maybe we can actually change our lives and the lives of all the other hunters, you know? Maybe we can allow people who have been bitten by werewolves, by vamps, who practice magic and are still trying to just live their lives -- maybe we can make things better for them, too. Maybe all of us can just...live.”

“Sounds like you’re trying to put us all out of a job,” Dean says.

Sam laughs. He says, “That’s the plan.”

“What’ll we even do if there are no more apocalypses, huh?” Dean says. “Or is it apocalypsi?”

“Hmm,” Sam says, pursing his lips. “Apocalypodes?”

Dean laughs. “Yeah. No more of those.”

Sam shrugs. “Whatever we want.”

“Yeah,” Dean agrees. He taps his fingers against his phone through the fabric of his jeans. “Whatever we want.”

\--

Dean finds a hunt the regular old-fashioned way: He Googles it.

He sets his laptop down in front of Sam, pointing at the screen. “Got a case,” he says. “And I didn’t even need a fancy program to find it.”

Sam huffs as he turns the laptop towards himself. “It isn’t done yet,” he says as he starts scanning the article. “But when it is, it’ll pick up on this kind of thing, see--” he points at the screen-- “because it mentions the victim died in a locked home with no apparent signs of forced entry, and even that a member of the previous family living in the house died there, too, and it’ll automatically compile any information about the property itself and deaths in the surrounding area and look for anything else that could be related and come up with a best guess, and flag this as a possible ghost or poltergeist--”

“Dude, all right, take a breath,” Dean says, taking back his laptop. “I did read the article. Are we gonna get going or what? Or has your computer already called someone up to take care of it?”

Sam rolls his eyes. “No, but actually, I think Eileen is up that way. I’ll see if she can meet us there?”

“Yeah, sounds good,” Dean says, though Sam has already pulled out his phone and started texting her.

Dean heads to his room to pack his things. He pulls out his duffel and sets it on his bed, slides his phone from his pocket. He stands there, hovering next to his empty bag, and turns the screen on, taps it periodically to keep it from fading back to black. Finally, he swipes it open, pulls up his messages, and types out a text to Cas.

**caught wind of a hunt up in nd, near Bismarck. u up to anything interesting?**

He plugs his phone in so it can charge and sets it on his nightstand while he packs. By the time he’s done, Cas has replied.

**keeping busy. stay safe.**

Dean sighs. He replies, **thanks. u too.** He slips his phone into his pocket and packs up his charger. He slings his bag over his shoulder and heads to the garage.

\--

The hunt turns out to be a simple salt and burn, nothing they haven’t handled a hundred times with just the two of them. They meet up with Eileen that night, and by the next, it’s over and done.

They part ways with Eileen after wrapping up the case, retreat to their separate motels. Dean wakes late the next morning to Sam prodding him impatiently, telling him to get ready, Eileen invited them to lunch.

They drive into Bismarck, meet up with Eileen at a place called Fireflour Pizza. Sam greets her with his voice and his hands both, and Eileen smiles and returns the gesture. Dean says his hello and offers a wave, and Eileen returns that, too.

They get seated and place their order, chatting until their food arrives. Dean grabs the first slice, and a few moments later, he has his mouth full of some of the best pizza he’s ever eaten. He pauses mid-chew to look up at Eileen and say, “This is amazing. How did you find this place?”

Eileen doesn’t respond, opting instead to simply look at him and smile with one eyebrow raised. “Oh, right,” he says. He chews and swallows his mouthful of food. “This place is incredible. How’d you find it?”

“Yelp,” Eileen says, taking another bite of her own food. “I figure if I’m going to be traveling all the time, may as well find something to enjoy about it.”

“Yelp?” Dean says.

“Really?” Eileen and Sam ask in unison.

Dean shrugs.

“Come on, Dean,” Eileen says, gesturing to one of her ears. “It’s so popular that even I’ve heard of it.”

Sam snorts into his drink. Eileen glances over at him, smiling as their eyes meet. Sam stuffs another bite of food into his mouth, then signs something at Eileen that has her grinning even wider. Dean, for his part, rolls his eyes, mutters “Cheater,” and returns to his food.

Sam and Eileen spend most of the meal talking and signing at the same time, striking up an easy conversation -- Sam asks about the restaurants Eileen has been to and she talks about places from coast to coast, lists them off so quickly that Sam complains he can’t possibly write them down quick enough. His eyes light up when she says not to worry, she’s got all the info saved in a spreadsheet, her own personal database.

It was like this during the hunt, too. He and Sam have always been able to communicate with looks and gestures well enough when they need to be silent, but this was something else. They’d learned early on that the remains had been cremated and spent most of the rest of the day figuring out what the spirit was still tethered to -- probably the worn and faded stuffed bear she’d had since childhood. After that, it had been a simple matter of Dean making conversation with the widower, keeping him confined to the kitchen while he thought Sam and Eileen were sitting waiting in the living room, though in reality they were searching through the house, looking for the stuffed animal. Sam and Eileen had split off to separate portions of the house, and when they had met back in the middle, an entire conversation beyond Dean’s understanding had passed between them.

Sam had given him a thumbs up, and that had been it -- no breaking and entering required. Just a matter of driving far enough away that they could burn the bear in peace, and that was that.

“Right, Dean?” Sam says, pulling Dean back to the present. He’s looking at Dean expectantly.

“Sorry,” Dean says. “What?”

“We should do this again sometime,” Sam says and signs. 

“Oh, right,” Dean says. “Yeah, for sure.”

Sam grins and turns back to Eileen, starts telling her about his program he’s working on, jokes about how maybe he can tie it into Yelp so it’ll automatically pick the best restaurants for them to go to during hunts. Eileen watches Sam’s hands as he speaks, stops him in the middle of his sentence and moves his fingers slightly, repeats the sign with him until he gets it perfect. She smiles at Sam and Sam smiles back, and Dean misses whatever it is Sam says that makes her laugh, loud and sudden, before she covers her mouth with her hand.

Sam ducks his head and signs something that has Eileen lowering her hand from her mouth. She signs something Dean recognizes -- a quick “thank you” -- almost shyly.

Something in Dean’s chest aches. He looks away and works on finishing his pizza.

\--

They’re halfway back to the bunker when Dean says lightly, “So, Eileen invited _us_ to lunch, huh?” He turns to raise an eyebrow at Sam, smirk at him.

“What?” Sam says, then turns and sees Dean’s expression. He says, “It’s not like that.”

“Yet,” Dean says.

Sam huffs. “Shut up,” he says, turning to look out the window, hiding his smile.

“Mmhmm, that’s what I thought,” Dean says.

\--

 **hunt went well,** Dean types to Cas that night, once they’re back in the bunker. After a moment’s hesitation, he adds, **how’re u?** and hits send.

 **I’m glad,** Cas responds. **I’m fine. How are you?**

 **same as always,** Dean replies. **hey, u heard of yelp?**

 **The sound? Yes, why?** Cas responds.

Dean laughs out loud in his empty room. **no reason. that’s perfect thanks.**

 **You’re welcome,** Cas responds.

\--

Sam gets back to work on his program the next day.

And the next day.

And the next.

“Dude, aren’t you ever going to take a break?” Dean asks, finally.

Sam sighs, runs a hand through his hair. “I’ve run into some, uh. Roadblocks.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, it’s--” Sam sighs, annoyed. “It’s a challenge adapting what the Brits had, you know? I want it to have that human element in it, because that’s so much of what the Brits were lacking, but it complicates things.” He gestures helplessly at his laptop. “It’s going to rely on user input and old fashioned methods because we don’t and never will have the resources the Brits had, so--”

“Where did all their money come from, anyway?” Dean asks.

“I’m not sure I want to know,” Sam says, shaking his head.

“Fair.”

“It’s just...it’s gonna be a slow process of finding out where everyone is, relying on self reporting, that kind of thing,” Sam explains. “It’s going to involve a lot of trial and error. A lot of voluntary participation, too. I don’t want to be Big Brother--” Dean scoffs and Sam rolls his eyes. “You know what I mean. Anyway, I’m still going to set it up to do GPS tracking, but it’s not foolproof, since you can turn the GPS off or since phones can run out of battery or be broken--”

“Or be taken somewhere we can’t track,” Dean says bitterly.

“It’s not a perfect system,” Sam agrees. “But it’s there if people want to opt in. And it’s a hell of a lot better than nothing.” He shrugs. “Anyway, in the meantime, we should just keep looking for cases the usual way.”

“You got it,” Dean says, clapping him on the shoulder, taking a seat across from him and booting up his laptop. He browses the news while Sam calls Mary, explains what he’s working on and asks if she can help them test it out. She turns on her GPS, and Sam plugs in some stuff, huffs in annoyance when it doesn’t work. He continues fiddling with it while Dean searches.

He comes across a potential case a couple hours later, what looks like a werewolf snacking on people’s organs a little north of LA. When Dean pitches it to Sam, though, he gets a frown in response.

“I really want to keep trying to get this working,” Sam says. “How about you head down there to get things started and I’ll catch up?”

Dean watches Sam for a long moment, his fingers flying over the keys, unperturbed by Dean’s slow response. Finally, he says, “Yeah, sure.” Sam nods absently, doesn’t even look up.

\--

Dean makes the drive in a day and a half and gets an early start the next morning, making his way from his motel room to the San Bernardino County Coroner’s Office.

He greets the receptionist cheerfully but gets barely a glance in response. “Oh,” she says, “your partner is already back there. Head on in.”

“My partner?” Dean asks.

That gets him a raised eyebrow and a glance. “Yeah, agent Carter?”

“Right,” Dean says. “Of course.”

“Second door on the left,” she says, hooking her thumb over her shoulder.

The second door on the left contains a corpse whose torso is a mess of open wounds and, staring pensively down at it, Castiel.

Cas looks up when Dean enters. His brow furrows briefly as Dean makes his way over to the slab, but by the time the door swings shut behind Dean, Cas’ expression has smoothed back out.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Dean asks.

“Hello to you, too, Dean,” Cas says, frowning. “I’m working this case, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.”

The room is so cold it’s practically a refrigerator, but Dean still feels overhot as he says, “Why didn’t you call us?”

“I’m an angel,” Cas says, as though that’s the full explanation.

“Okay?” Dean says.

“I don’t need your help,” Cas says.

Dean stares at him for a long moment, hands clenched into fists where they rest against the cool metal of the slab. “Right,” he says. “Yeah, of course.” He forces himself to smile. “Well, I drove all this way, so you’re still stuck with me for this one. I’ll try not to get in the way.”

Cas frowns at him again. He says, “Dean, that’s not--”

“So,” Dean interrupts, looking down at the body lying between them. “Heart missing, huh? You thinking werewolf?”

Cas sighs, shakes his head. “It’s not just her heart that’s missing. It’s the rest of her organs, too, and…”

“And?”

“The victim probably didn’t know it yet, but she was pregnant.”

“Okay,” Dean says. “So?”

“Given the large population of people here of Indonesian descent, I think it’s likely it’s a pontianak.”

“A what now?” Dean asks.

“They’re spirits,” Cas says. “Specifically, of people who died in childbirth. It fits.”

“Oh,” Dean says, swallowing hard. “Yeah, I think you’re right. Good catch.”

\--

Dean calls Sam that night from his motel room as he’s gathering his gear for the final leg of the hunt. “Cas is here,” he says, by way of greeting. “What the fuck?”

“Hopefully he’s not standing right next to you,” Sam says.

“He’s waiting outside,” Dean says, shifting to hold his phone between his ear and shoulder so he can continue packing while he talks. “He was here before me.”

“Why do you sound so surprised?” Sam asks.

Dean pauses his packing to throw his hands in the air. “Why don’t you?”

“Uh, because he’s been hunting?” Sam says. “I thought you knew that?”

“I--” Dean says. “I mean, I just-- I wasn’t expecting--”

There are a few beats of silence before Sam prompts, “Dean?”

Dean shifts his phone back to his hand, drags the other over his face. He grabs his gun from under his pillow and tosses it into his bag with his crowbar, his salt, his lighter fluid and matches. “Whatever,” he says. “Anyway, this is going to be stupid easy with Cas here. We’ll probably get this wrapped up tonight and I’ll head back tomorrow, so you shouldn’t even bother making the drive.”

“You sure?” Sam asks.

“Yeah, I’m sure,” Dean says. “No big deal.”

\--

He’s right. It’s stupid easy with Cas there.

They wrap up the case with a good old fashioned smiting. It’s early enough in the evening that Dean could get a head start on the drive, probably make it back to the bunker by tomorrow night. It’s probably what he should do, rather than burning more money on another night in a motel, but instead he finds himself fiddling with his keys rather than getting into the Impala, watching Cas’ back as he walks towards his truck.

“Hey, so, wait,” Dean says, just as Cas is opening the door. Cas turns back, tilts his head slightly. “So where’ve you been staying, anyway?”

Cas frowns at him. “Staying?”

Dean says, “Like, where have you set up shop or whatever? Where do you go to sleep?”

Cas’ face goes carefully blank before he says, “I don’t sleep, Dean, you know that.”

Dean feels his face flush. “Yeah, right, of course,” he says. “But I do, and I mean. I just.” He shrugs. “Turns out Yelp is also this food review thing, and I know you don’t eat, either, but there’s this place I wanna try, so if you wanna hang out a little tomorrow, y’know, unless you have somewhere more important to be--”

“No, I--” Cas says. Something in his expression softens until he’s smiling slightly. “I’d like that.”

“Great,” Dean says, grinning. “It’s a date.”

\--

They meet up for breakfast at Restore Kitchen. Dean orders something called “pig candy” on the merits of the name alone. Cas gets coffee, sits there sipping it while Dean eats more of the best damn food he’s had that he hasn’t cooked himself. Every now and then Dean catches Cas watching him over the rim of his mug, this strange sort of half-smile on his face, like Dean is doing something endearing and not just shoveling food into his mouth.

Dean talks to him between bites, tells him how they’ve been meeting up with Eileen, how Sam is learning ASL and playing it off, feeding him lines like, “Oh, well, she shouldn’t always have to be the one accommodating us.” He laughs as he tells Cas how horribly transparent it is, then shifts to explaining the program Sam is developing, the grand plan he’s working on to put them all out of a job. Cas listens in that way he has, leaning with his elbows on the table, asking Dean questions.

Dean can’t stop himself. He says, “You must know about all this, though. You must have heard about it from Sam already.”

“I, uh…” Cas says.

“Don’t lie to me.”

Cas huffs. “I wasn’t going to.” He adds, “I like hearing it from you.”

“Yeah, sure,” Dean says, looking down at his plate, taking another bite of his bacon.

\--

They get all the way to the end of the meal, sitting in silence as their waiter clears their plates, brings the check. Cas waits patiently as Dean signs a fake name, and then they wander outside together, stand looking at each other over the roof of the Impala, Dean drumming his fingers on the metal.

Before Cas can turn to get in his truck, Dean asks, “Why didn’t you tell me you were hunting?”

Cas is silent for a moment, and then he says, carefully, “I wasn’t aware I needed your permission.”

Dean’s hand stills. “Yeah,” he says. “I suppose you don’t.” He stares Cas down, his car between them. He’s the first to look away. “Anyway, uh. See you.”

Cas sighs. “Yes. See you.”

Dean opens his door, slides into the driver’s seat. He pulls his phone out of his pocket to text sam, **on my way back.** By the time he’s done, Cas has driven away.

He checks his phone again when he stops for gas an hour later. He has one message; it’s from Sam. **Great. Just a heads up, Eileen is here.**

\--

Dean gets back the next evening and is immediately pulled in by Sam and Eileen talking excitedly about what they’ve been working on. It turns out that in the few days he’s been gone, Eileen has been at the bunker, helping Sam with his program. They’ve figured out the GPS tracking and mapping, and they insist on demonstrating, Sam moving away down the hallway and Eileen zooming in on the map, showing Dean how accurate it is.

“You’re in the wrong line of work,” Dean says, once Sam and Eileen are both back in the same room. “You should go work for Google. Hear it pays better.”

They laugh, and Sam says, grinning, “This is great, though. We can start calling around to get people on here now, maybe mom and Claire, and Max and Alicia, too. The more hunters we add, the better, so we can compare their locations against hunts that pop up and direct people there, piece of cake.” Eileen nods along, smiling.

Their excitement carries Dean through unpacking his bag, showering, rummaging through the cabinets to put together a meal. He thinks back on the breakfast he’d shared with Cas, sighs to himself as he starts gathering ingredients to make his own hash like he’d seen on the menu, complete with eggs and grilled tomatoes on the side.

They all sit down around the table once he’s done cooking. As he piles food onto his plate, Sam says, “Dean, this looks amazing.”

Dean shrugs. “Figure you kids deserve a reward.”

Eileen takes her first bite, chews thoughtfully for a moment and then pointedly sets down her fork and pulls out her phone. Sam taps her on the shoulder, asks, “What’s up?”

Eileen looks back down at her phone, taps at the screen, and says, “I’m leaving your secret underground bunker a five star review on Yelp.”

Dean laughs, swallows his food, gestures at Eileen with his fork. “For the record,” he says, when she looks up, “you’re welcome here any time.”

\--

“Did you mean that?” Sam says the next morning, as they watch Eileen drive away, waving. “About her staying here?”

Dean scuffs his boot against the ground. “Sure, why not?” he says. “We’ve got the room, and we’re here at the center of the country, so, you know, with your whole master plan, if she’s not already tethered somewhere. It only makes sense, right?”

When Sam doesn’t respond, Dean turns slightly, watches him out of the corner of his eye. Sam is smiling to himself, staring off down the road.

Dean puts his hands in his pockets, turns and heads back down into the bunker.

\--

Sam heads off to meet up with Eileen and Claire to take out what sounds like a pair of vetala setting up shop on the outskirts of Rapid City. Meanwhile, he sends Dean off to meet up with Mary, Max, and Alicia to take out a vamp nest that popped up in the mountains west of Denver.

It could have been messy with just one or two people, but with four it’s a walk in the park. They hose the blood off their hands, and as they’re driving back towards town, Dean pulls up Yelp and finds them a bar. There’s a place called Revival Brews in Evergreen that one reviewer says is perfect for “a post-hike meal.” Dean figures trekking through the woods to hunt down some monsters is close enough.

Fifteen minutes later, they’re sitting around a table, sipping their beers and sharing some wings and fried pickles. “You know,” Dean says, “with your knife skills--” he nods at Alicia, then at Max-- “and the way you throw people around with a flick of your wrist? I feel like you guys and Cas would really get along.”

Max and Alicia share a look. “Cas?” Max asks. “You mean--”

“--like as in Castiel?” Alicia finishes.

“Yes?” Dean says.

They lean towards him, elbows resting on the table. “Those stories are true?” Alicia asks.

Mary leans forward, now, too, says, “Wait, what stories?”

Max’s eyes light up. Dean groans, says, “Oh God, please don’t--”

“There are books,” Max says.

Alicia nods. “A whole series of them.”

“About my boys?” Mary asks.

“Unfortunately,” Dean says. “Chuck wrote these things that were supposed to be the Winchester Gospels or whatever, but really, they just read like crap because, get this, it turns out God was kind of a crap writer.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry,” Mary says, patting Dean on the arm. “I’m not interested in reading them. Ever.”

“Thank God,” Dean says, taking a long pull of his drink.

“It sounds like he’s the last person anyone should be thanking,” Mary says wryly.

“No kidding,” Dean says.

“You’re missing out,” Max says.

Alicia nods. “Chuck may not have been the best writer--” Max snorts, and Alicia rolls her eyes-- “but he sure must have liked Castiel. Everything about him seemed larger than life, you know?”

Max nods along. “It’s a pretty great story, right?” he says. “An angel rebelling against heaven, risking it all to help these two humans he’d become friends with.”

Max and Alicia both turn on Dean, then, raising their eyebrows at him. “So,” Alicia says.

“Is it true?” Max asks.

Dean shrugs, looks down at his glass, turns it round and round with one hand. “Yeah, that’s all true. He helped us save the world.”

“Still is helping,” Mary says.

Dean looks up in time to see Max and Alicia nodding, but then they share another look. Alicia chews her lip, looks down at the table, but Max leans forward and asks, voice low, “What about the other rumors?”

Something in Dean’s chest lurches. “What rumors?”

“The rest of the stuff,” Alicia says.

“The stuff that comes after the books,” Max says.

Dean shifts in his seat. “Lot has happened since then.”

“Heard he did some shady shit,” Max says, and Alicia hisses his name, elbows him in the side. “What?” Max says. “You’ve heard the stories.”

Dean looks down at his drink, ignores the look his mom is giving him, the way she’s considering him steadily in his peripheral vision. “I’m not gonna say there weren’t some...rough spots,” he says. “But it’s not like that. He’s not like that any more.”

“Dean’s right,” Mary says. “I don’t know everything Castiel has done, but I know who he is now. He’s one of the good guys.”

Max holds his hands up defensively. “All right, all right, I get it,” he says. “We’re just curious. I mean, you hear about a dude with a hundred foot wingspan, who wouldn’t be.”

Dean snorts. “A hundred feet? Don’t tell him that. We’d never hear the end of it. It’s maybe twenty feet, tops.”

“What about his true form?” Alicia asks. “Is it really as tall as the Chrysler Building?”

Dean grins. “Okay, that one’s actually true,” he says. “Or at least according to Cas it is.”

“Has he really been wearing the same clothes since you met?” Mary asks. When Dean groans in response, she says, “What? I’m a little curious, too.”

“I mean, he uh,” Dean says, gesturing vaguely at his own torso. “He’s changed his coat and tie, at least? I dunno, it’s just. It’s an angel thing, I guess.” He shrugs. “And anyway, listen, I’m not your-- your-- your personal Snopes, or whatever--”

“Okay, last question, we promise,” Max says, leaning across the table again.

Alicia leans in, too, and says, “The handprint.”

“Is it real?” Max asks.

“Yeah, it’s real,” Dean says, huffing a laugh. “Freaked me the fuck out the first time I saw it. Figured anything with the power to pull me out of hell, leave a mark like that? Couldn’t possibly be good.”

Max and Alicia glance at one another, then at Dean’s shoulder, then straight at him. Alicia asks, “Can we see it?”

Dean shifts in his seat. “I, uh,” he says. “I don’t have it any more.”

Max scoffs in disbelief. “How do you lose something like that?”

“It’s complicated,” Dean says, and knocks back the rest of his drink.

\--

Dean gets back to the bunker before Sam does. He goes through his usual routine -- unpacks his duffel, tosses his clothes in the laundry, hits the showers -- before he makes his way to the kitchen. He makes himself a sandwich and eats it in silence at the table as he looks at his phone. Two messages from Sam: **Hunt’s taking longer than we thought. Gonna be a few more days.** and **By the way, Claire says hi, kind of begrudgingly.**

Dean huffs a half laugh and shoots back, **thanks for the heads up. hi to Claire, reluctantly.**

He texts Cas next, says, **did u know hunters tell stories about u?**

Dean finishes his sandwich, puts his plate in the sink, goes to check on his laundry. He gets a reply after he’s done loading everything into the dryer: **No. Only good things, I hope.**

 **yep, of course,** Dean texts back, and goes to watch some TV until his clothes are done.

\--

Dean dreams of purgatory, gets it in bits and pieces -- waking up on the ground in the dark, eyes staring at him from the shadows. Walking through the woods alone, weapon in hand. Running and fighting and searching with Benny, heart racing, muscles straining, every inch of him hurting. Praying to Cas night after night after night until his ears ring with the words, and--

Dean jolts awake to find his phone ringing, reaches blindly for it where it sits on his nightstand, blinks a few times so he can read the name on the caller ID. Cas.

He swipes to accept the call as he sits up, heart pounding in his chest. “Cas?” he says, glancing at his clock. It’s barely past three. “What’s wrong?”

Cas hesitates. “I’m sorry for waking you,” he says, an edge to his voice Dean can’t quite name. “I--”

“Cas. It’s fine,” Dean says, heart still racing. He runs a hand through his hair. “Is everything okay?”

“Yes, I just...” Cas pauses again. “I could use some help on this hunt.”

\--

Dean drags himself out of bed, mentally patting himself on the back for actually going to sleep at a reasonable hour. He’s pretty sure he’s fine to drive, but he makes himself some coffee for the road anyway, texts Sam as he’s leaving to let him know what’s going on, and makes the nine-hour drive to Angel Fire, New Mexico in just over eight.

Cas has done all the legwork already -- examined the bodies, interviewed the witnesses, talked to the authorities. It’s just a matter of actually finding the half-starved chupacabra that’s been attacking tourists.

It should be simple, once they’ve been pointed in the right direction. It should just be a matter of Cas following the clues, using his super-human senses or whatever other tricks angels always seem to have up their sleeves to track the thing back to its lair. Instead, he seems...off. Distracted, maybe. But every time Dean asks him if he’s okay, he says he’s fine. Eventually all he gets in response is an annoyed sigh, so he stops asking.

When they finally do manage to find it, the fight is more difficult than Dean expected. When they had fought the pontianak, Cas had smote her nearly as soon as she had appeared. With the chupacabra, it comes out of nowhere, lunges at Cas and knocks him to the ground, trying to snap at his face while he fends it off with one arm. Dean runs towards him, meaning to bury his knife in the chupacabra’s side, but by the time he gets there, Cas has managed to get a hand on it, killing it in a flash of light before pushing its limp body off himself.

Dean watches, unmoving, as Cas stands up, brushes the dirt off his clothes. He meets Cas’ eyes and nods, slipping his knife back into his belt. He follows behind Cas in silence as they walk back to the car.

“Cas,” Dean says, finally, as they stand on either side of the Impala. “Why did you really call me?”

Cas stiffens. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“I dunno, man,” Dean says, throwing his hands out to the side. “You’ve just been. Off. But even so, this clearly isn’t something you actually needed help with, so I just--”

“Well, I’m sorry for wasting your time,” Cas snaps.

Dean shuts his mouth with an audible click. He gets into the car without another word.

\--

Dean spends the evening sitting in his motel room, half-watching TV as he flips his phone over and over in his hand. It’s nearly midnight by the time he finally he mutes the TV, swipes at his phone, and gives Cas a call.

Cas answers after a few rings. “Hey, so,” Dean says, before Cas has a chance to say anything, “I just wanted to say I’m s--”

“Dean?” Cas interrupts, voice rough and tired.

Dean stops, scoffs. “Don’t need to sleep, huh?” he says. “You’re so full of shit.”

“Dean, wait,” Cas says, sounding more like himself now. “I can explain.”

Dean presses his free hand to his face, massages at his forehead. “Fine.”

Cas hesitates. “It’s...complicated.”

Dean sighs, runs his hand through his hair. “It always is with you, Cas.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Cas says.

Dean throws his hand up, lets it fall back onto the bed. “Nothing, man, just.” He sighs again. “I just wanna know what’s going on with you.”

There’s a long pause, then, nothing but Cas breathing on the other end of the line. Finally, he says, “I can show you, if you want.”

\--

The next morning, Dean makes the hour and a half drive south to the address Cas texted him, meets him on the front steps of a hospital.

“I’m sorry about the drive,” Cas says. “This was the closest one.”

“Okay,” Dean says. Before he can ask for an explanation, Cas nods towards the front doors, starts making his way inside.

Cas greets the receptionist -- Jennifer, according to her nametag -- pleasantly. “We’re here to see our cousin who’s fallen into a coma,” he lies, smoothly, easily.

“Oh,” Jennifer says. “You must mean Joanna Nelson?” At Cas’ nod, Jennifer turns back to her computer, pulls up Joanna’s records. “Mmm,” she says, frowning slightly. “It looks like she hasn’t had any visitors in a while.” Cas smiles sadly as she continues, “That’s usually how it goes, with cases like these, but--”

Cas nods sympathetically. “I wish we could make it out here more often,” he says. “But you know how it is--”

Jennifer nods. She holds out a clipboard for them to sign, then gives them a room number, reminds them to check out again when they’re done.

They make their way to the elevators in silence, then down the hallway and into one of the rooms. Dean stands next to Cas and looks down at the woman lying there. _Joanna,_ he reminds himself as he grabs the chart from the end of her bed and skims it.

“She’s been in a coma for over a year,” Dean says. “I’m no doctor, but I’m pretty sure that’s the kind of thing people don’t usually come back from.”

Cas makes a sound of agreement, and then he reaches his hand out and places it on Joanna’s forehead. A moment later, the gentle glow of his grace washes over Joanna’s face, shifts the light in the room. When he pulls his arm back he sways a little on his feet, and Dean reaches out automatically, heart racing, and steadies him with a hand on his elbow.

“What happened?” a voice says, and Dean startles, turns back to the bed to find Joanna looking up at them, brow furrowed. She reaches one hand up to press it against her forehead. “Where am I?”

“The hospital,” Cas says. “A nurse will be in soon to explain everything.” He smiles at her and adds, “Your wife and children will be very happy to see you.”

\--

“So,” Dean says, once they’re back outside, sitting on a bench in front of the hospital.

“So,” Cas says. “That’s what I’ve been doing, when I can.”

Dean stares at him for a long moment, at the way he’s leaning back against the bench, at the dark circles under his eyes, at the wrinkles in his coat where Dean had grabbed his arm. “It costs you something to do that,” he says.

Cas nods. “It’s a delicate balance,” he admits. “To not do too much all at once. Hunting, healing…” He shrugs. “Sometimes I have to choose.”

“Ah,” Dean says.

They sit in silence for a few moments, watching cars pass. Finally, Cas says, “It was true when I told you that I didn’t need to sleep, but it...it comes and goes, not always predictably. I’m not human, but…” he sighs. “Still too human to be wholly angel, I suppose. Anyway. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I didn’t want you to worry.”

“Well that worked out great, huh?” Dean says, without heat, nudging Cas with his elbow. Cas huffs an acknowledgment, almost smiles as he looks down at his hands.

“That’s great, though,” Dean says. “You’re helping people.”

Cas nods. He says, “In as many ways as I can.”

“It suits you,” Dean says. “Aren’t you worried, though? About raising red flags? People tend to notice stuff like miracles.”

Cas shrugs. “Not as much as you’d think. Humans have a remarkable capacity for explaining away things they don’t understand. God himself was here and your sun was dying and your news has already found a rational explanation. They’ve interviewed experts, prepared reports, talked it to death.”

Dean laughs, says, “Fair enough.” He leans back against the bench, watches people coming and going. “So. What’re you gonna do now?”

Cas _hmm_ s thoughtfully. “More of the same, I suppose.”

\--

When Dean gets back, Sam and Eileen are in the middle of moving her into the bunker.

There’s not much to it. Like so many hunters, Eileen has spent most of her life on the road, always needing to be ready to move place to place at a moment’s notice. The sum total of everything she owns fits in a small stack in the hallway.

The bigger task is cleaning out a room for her. They’ve already started clearing out one close to Sam’s, so Dean rolls up his sleeves and helps. They pull out stacks of boxes and move them to one of the rooms they’ve designated for storage, leave them to be indexed and archived later. Dean rummages through the closets to find a spare set of sheets and some blankets, tosses them into the wash to freshen them up after years of disuse. They beat the dust out of the mattress, scrub the floors, wipe down the dresser and desk and nightstand, get a new lightbulb for the lamp.

They bring Eileen’s things in last, setting them at the foot of the bed, and then Sam turns to Eileen. They’re all sweaty and dirty from spending hours cleaning up decades worth of dust and grime, and Eileen’s things look a little sad sitting in a small, lonely pile in the middle of the sparse room, but as Sam is talking and signing to her -- as he’s telling her how it may look pretty bare now but she can decorate it however she wants, make it her own -- as she looks around at the nearly empty space, she looks like she’s never been happier.

Dean recognizes it, that excitement. Remembers feeling like a kid on Christmas morning for the first time in his life when he realized he had a space that was finally his.

It’s only when Eileen turns that look on Sam that Dean quietly excuses himself, slips out of the door and down the hallway.

 **we set up a room for Eileen today,** Dean texts Cas as he heads towards his room.

He’s in the middle of grabbing some fresh clothes when his phone vibrates in his pocket.

 **I’m sure she and Sam are both happy,** Cas has replied.

 **yeah, no kidding. it’s great we have enough room,** Dean responds as he heads towards the showers.

Cas hasn’t responded by the time he gets there, so he waits a few more minutes before giving up and hopping in the shower. Cas still hasn’t replied by the time he’s dried off and changed into his clean clothes, either, or by the time Dean gets back to his room, or by the time Dean wanders into the kitchen to dig up some dinner.

It’s only as they’re in the middle of eating, the three of them sitting around the table talking and laughing, that Cas’ reply comes, his last of the night: **Yes, it is.**

\--

The next morning, Dean checks the news over breakfast. By the time he’s done, he hasn’t seen any sign of Sam and Eileen, so he washes his dishes and wanders down the hallway and into the war room. When he looks through to the library, there they are, Sam half sitting on the table with Eileen nestled between his legs. Sam has his giant hands cupping Eileen’s face, and even from here, Dean can see the way they’re both smiling into the kiss.

Dean opens his mouth meaning to say, _Forty freaking rooms in this place and you kids couldn’t find somewhere more private?_ but the words get stuck in his throat. He swallows them down, turns around, and walks back down the hallway towards his room.

\--

A few more hours of searching yield something that looks vaguely like a hunt.

Dean fishes his phone out of his pocket and pulls up Cas’ contact. He spends a few long moments with his thumb hovering over the call button before he finally manages to press it.

The call rings long enough that Dean is pretty sure it’s going to voicemail, but Cas picks up at the last second. He says, sounding tired, “Hello, Dean.”

“Hey,” Dean says. “So, uh. Listen, I found this thing that might be a case, down south just across the Texas border. Sam and Eileen are kind of...tied up at the moment, so I was wondering, if you’ve got some spare time…”

There’s a pause before Cas says, “Of course.”

“Great,” Dean says, “I’ll send you the details. See you soon.”

“See you soon,” Cas echos.

Dean packs his things up quietly, doesn’t see Sam and Eileen on his way out of the bunker, doesn’t even bother texting Sam until he’s already sitting in the garage with the Impala’s engine idling. Just a quick message: **found a case, no big deal, Cas is gonna help me with it. you kids have fun.**

He doesn’t wait for a response. Instead, he puts his phone back in his pocket, takes a deep breath, then shifts into drive and heads out onto the road.

\--

Dean meets up with Cas the next morning, waves at him as he makes his way across the parking lot. “Hey,” he says, swallowing against the tightness in his chest. He clears his throat. “Thanks for coming.”

Cas considers him carefully before he says, “I’m always happy to help.”

Dean nods, sticks his hands in his pockets as he leans against Cas’ truck. “It’s probably nothing,” he says. “I mean, I know this is a stretch, probably not our kinda thing, you know, just an accident or a good old fashioned human on human murder, right? But I figure…” He trails off, shrugging.

“It could be our kind of thing,” Cas supplies.

Dean lets out a breath, half smiles. “Yeah, better safe than sorry.”

Cas nods, tilts his head towards his truck. “Shall we?”

\--

They go through their usual steps -- looking at the body, talking to the person who found the victim, talking to the cops -- and spend the entire time getting eyerolls from nearly everyone they encounter.

They press on,ignoring the questions about why the feds are investigating what’s clearly an animal attack, anyway. They should probably just call it quits, but every time Dean thinks about giving up it feels like something is slowly crushing the air out of his lungs.

Cas looks tired, too, keeps coughing into his elbow, clearing his throat. He’s exceedingly patient, anyway, keeps saying things like “You never know” to Dean and “We’re simply covering our bases” to the people giving them skeptical looks.

When they finally get into Cas’ truck to head into the woods where the attack took place, Cas loosens his tie, takes a deep breath before turning the key in the ignition. Dean watches him for a few moments before turning to look out the window, idly rubbing his hand against his chest.

\--

When all is said and done, the people who were giving them skeptical looks were right. They manage to find the site of the attack, look at the traces of blood and fur, the pawprints on the outskirts of the campsite. Cougars aren’t common here, Dean knows, but they’re also not unheard of.

“So,” Cas says, standing from where he was pretending to examine the dirt. “What’s our next step?”

Dean huffs a laugh. “Okay, I appreciate that,” he says, “but we both know this isn’t our kinda thing.”

Cas hesitates. “It doesn’t appear to be,” he admits.

“So what now?”

Cas looks at the ground, hands in his pockets, and says, “I suppose that’s it. You can go home.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Dean says. He runs a hand through his hair, across the back of his neck. He takes a deep breath. “But I mean, the night’s young. You wanna do dinner?”

Cas squints, looks off into the distance. “All right,” he says, and walks next to Dean, back to his truck.

\--

They make idle conversation throughout most of their meal, Dean wolfing down his meatloaf and mashed potatoes, watching as Cas eats his chicken fried steak, pokes at his green beans. As they’re finishing the last of their food, Dean asks, “Hey man, you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Cas says. “Are you?” There’s an edge to his words, like he’s making an accusation.

Dean frowns at him. “Uh, yeah, of course I’m fine,” he says.

Cas sighs.

Dean tries again. He clears his throat and says, “You know, if you ever need a place to crash. We’ve always got the room.”

Cas looks up at him at that, considers him carefully. “I appreciate you offering,” he says. “Thank you.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, looking away, down at his plate. “No problem.”

\--

The war room is transforming.

Sam has been pooling their knowledge, connecting up with other hunters, putting them into the program. He’s been making phone calls and typing nonstop into his phone, only taking breaks to eat when Dean sets food in front of him and sleep when Eileen forces him to go to bed.

Sam built his own desktop computer and has it hooked up to the rest of his system in the war room. There are phones set up like Bobby used to have, meticulously labeled, and they’ve modified the table, turned it into a touch screen map of the U.S. that’s actually really freaking cool. They’ve got a semblance of a system up and running, and Dean is excited about it in his own right, but not as excited as he is to see Sam so excited about it.

The first test run flags a werewolf pack on the eastern edge of Tennessee and tells them it’s big enough that even though Max and Alicia are the closest, they won’t be able to handle it safely on their own. Sam, Dean, and Eileen pack their bags and head out, and with the five of them working together, they make short work of it.

They sit around a table at Hot Rods 50’s Diner after, and Sam’s eyes light up when Max and Alicia ask them how their new system works.

“Do you have it set up in a van so you can wheel around like the feds do in the movies?” Max asks.

“Or do you move it from motel room to motel room or what?” Alicia adds.

Sam stops mid-chew to give them a quizzical look. “No,” he says, “it’s set up in the bunker. I thought I explained…?”

Max and Alicia glance at one another, then back at Sam. “Wait,” they say, in unison. “What?”

Dean raises his eyebrows. “Guess the books never got that far.”

“The Men of Letters,” Eileen explains. “We’re legacies. Sam and Dean managed to find one of their bunkers, which would be surprising, except, given their history…” She smiles, rolls her eyes.

“Holy shit,” Alicia says.

“They’re not just a myth?” Max asks.

Sam shakes his head. “They’re real. But their systems were a little, uh...outdated.” He winces. “By more than just a few decades. So we’ve been upgrading it, making it into a viable home base. We’ve got a phone system set up, and we’re in the process of compiling everything from the Men of Letters’ archives, cataloging all the stuff they left behind…”

“We’ve got a touchscreen map of the states, too,” Eileen says. She gestures to the table in front of them, adds, “Even bigger than this. It’s awesome.”

“It’s more than that, though,” Dean says. “We’ve got our own rooms, too. A kitchen, amazing showers, a washer and dryer. It’s home.”

There are a few beats of silence before Alicia says, voice flat, “Wow. That sounds great.”

“Yeah,” Max says. “Sounds like you guys have got your work cut out for you, so uh.”

“We better be going,” Alicia says.

Dean can feel Sam’s eyes on him as Alicia and Max get up from their seats, say their goodbyes. As soon as they’re out the door, Dean turns so Eileen can see him speaking and says, “Look, I didn’t want to offer without running it by you, but are you guys cool with--”

“Yes,” Eileen and Sam say simultaneously.

“Be right back,” Dean says. He pushes his chair back from the table, half-jogs outside and catches Max and Alicia just as they’re starting to back out of their parking spot. Alicia raises an eyebrow as she rolls down her window.

“Hey, listen,” Dean says. “The thing about the bunker is, well...it was designed to hold a lot more than just three people, you know? So no pressure. But if you guys want somewhere more permanent to stay, we’ve got room.”

They don’t look at each other, just look straight at him as Alicia says, “We’ll talk it over.”

Thirty minutes later, Dean pulls one hand off the steering wheel to answer his phone. It’s Alicia.

“So,” she says, “I think we’ll take you up on that offer.”

\--

By the time they stop for gas a few hours later, Dean has multiple texts from Alicia waiting for him: One that says **we’re packing up our stuff,** another from thirty minutes after that that says **we’re done and checking out of our motel,** another ten minutes after that that says **we’re on our way,** and the last one, from just a minute later, **if that’s okay.**

Dean smirks. They’re on their way already, ready or not, probably less than an hour behind them, but Dean texts back anyway, **that’s fine. cya soon.**

As he wanders into the gas station to grab some snacks for the road, he opens up his text message conversation with Cas. The last messages are from the day before: Dean’s **meeting up with Max & Alicia for a hunt. how about u?** and Cas’ **same as always. be safe.**

He stands for a minute with his finger hovering over the keyboard. He types out, **so guess what? Max and Alicia are moving into--**

He stops, glances up and grabs a bag of chips from the shelf. Looks back down and deletes what he’s written. Turns off the screen and puts his phone back in his pocket.

\--

The five of them make short work of cleaning out a couple more rooms, getting everything dusted and scrubbed and aired out.

Dean showers first and cooks dinner while everyone else gets cleaned up, makes meatloaf and mashed potatoes and roasted brussels sprouts. He’s waiting for the loaf to finish in the oven, leaning against the counter fiddling with his phone, when he hears footsteps and looks up.

“It smells amazing in here,” Sam says.

“Damn right it does,” Dean says, grinning. He sets his phone on the counter, turns to sneak a look into the oven. “Should be just a few more minutes.”

Everyone else filters in one by one, each of them telling Dean in turn how good the food smells. Dean finds himself smiling throughout the whole meal, looking around at everyone talking and laughing. They even pause halfway through so Eileen can take a picture of them all crowded around the small table.

Max finishes his food, sets his fork down with a flourish, and says, “Wow. We definitely made the right choice taking you up on that offer.”

“Hell yes we did,” Alicia says.

“Another five star meal,” Eileen adds.

“Yeah, well,” Dean says. “Don’t get used to--” He’s distracted by his phone vibrating where it sits on the table. He glances down at it, looks back up, realizes he’s forgotten what he was saying. “Uh--”

Sam stands, grabbing both his plate and Dean’s as he says, “Here, we’ll clean up.”

“Oh,” Dean says. His phone vibrates again. “Thanks.”

Sam nods, heading for the sink. Eileen gets up to help, shooing Max and Alicia out of the kitchen. Once Sam and Eileen have busied themselves with washing the dishes, Dean picks up his phone to check his messages. He sighs, then internally scolds himself for sighing.

“That Cas?” Sam asks, without turning around.

“Nah,” Dean says, opening the texts to read them. “It’s mom. She finished up her last hunt, wants to know if we’ve got something new for her.”

“I’ll take a look after we finish and let her know,” Sam says.

“All right,” Dean says. He types out **Sam’s gonna check on it and get back to u,** hits send. He thinks for a minute and adds, **hey, u wanna come over for dinner sometime soon?**

 **Sounds good,** comes Mary’s reply, and then, a few seconds later, **I’d love to.**

Dean grins at the text for a few seconds and then sends back, **awesome.** He closes the conversation and feels his smile falter. He pockets his phone, waves to Sam and Eileen as he heads out of the kitchen.

\--

Dean is slow to get out of bed the next morning. When he finally grabs a cup of coffee and makes his way into the war room, he’s greeted by Sam informing him, without pausing for breath, that he found another hunt for mom and sent Max and Alicia off to help, that some hunter named Raymond texted him asking for backup on a case so he and Eileen are going to head that way, and there’s another hunt a couple states over and Cas is already on his way and would Dean mind going to help him out?

Dean takes a sip of his coffee. “Does he even need my help?”

“I already told him you were coming,” Sam says mildly. “I’m sure he’d welcome the company.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, shoving his free hand into his robe pocket. “All right.”

Which is how Dean ends up smack dab in the middle of Utah later that evening, checking into a motel even though Sam told him the case just looked like a simple salt and burn.

“A single?” the guy at the front desk says.

“No, a double,” Dean says. The clerk nods, and then Dean says, “Wait, uh--”

“Hm?” the clerk says, not looking up from his computer screen as he types.

“Nothing,” Dean says. A few minutes later, he’s got keys in hand and is heading to his room.

\--

By evening the next day, it’s clear this isn’t just a simple salt and burn and they are, in fact, going to have their work cut out for them.

It had seemed like a ghost at first, then a witch, and now Cas is thinking maybe it’s a cursed object. They spent the day following a bunch of rabbit trails, but Dean finds himself energized by it rather than frustrated. It seems to be the case for Cas as well -- there aren’t any circles under his eyes this time, at least, even though they took a detour during the day so Cas could help a kid who had fallen, his father fussing over him. He’d given some spiel about being a doctor and smiled at the kid as he fixed his broken arm.

They’re still trying to figure out what the alleged cursed object might be when they decide to call it a night. They’re about to go their separate ways until the morning, and Dean chews his lip for a few seconds as Cas makes his way to his truck before he says, “Hey, listen.”

Cas stops, turns back around. “Hm?”

“I know you don’t always need to sleep or whatever,” Dean says. “But we did good today. You earned the right to kick back at least, huh?”

Cas tilts his head. He says, “I suppose so?”

“Well,” Dean says. “They only had doubles, anyway, so why don’t you come hang out with me? We can get some pizza, watch a movie.”

A slow smile spreads across Cas’ face. He says, “I would like that.”

\--

They make their way to Dean’s motel, Dean in the Impala and Cas following in his truck. Dean spends the drive drumming his fingers on the wheel, glancing between the road and the rearview mirror.

Cas follows him inside once they get there, and Dean gestures to a spot on one of the beds. He tosses Cas the remote, lets him flip through the channels as he looks up a place on Yelp. It’s an easy choice -- Cavalier Pizza is the only place in town that delivers, so he calls in an order. When he hangs up, he finds Cas frowning at the TV.

“Isn’t this the actor from _Die Hard?_ ” Cas asks.

Dean looks up at the screen and sure enough, it’s Bruce Willis, but this is distinctly not _Die Hard_. Dean recognizes a scene from _The Color of Night_ and nearly chokes. “Uh, yeah,” he says. “But I’m not sure this is...exactly dinner movie material.”

“What do you mean?” Cas asks, frowning.

“It’s just, uh…” Dean clears his throat. “The movie’s not great, anyway. Let’s find something else.”

Cas shrugs and resumes scrolling through the channels. They settle on _The Terminator_ just as the pizza arrives.

Cas takes his first few bites, then announces, “This is quite good.”

“Mmm,” Dean agrees around a mouthful. When he’s done chewing, he adds, “I bet I could do better than this, though.” He wipes his hand on a napkin, drums his fingers against his knee. “I’d make the sauce with a little more of a kick to it, I think. Put twice the cheese and at least fifty percent more toppings. Make the crust a little chewier, maybe. I want to experiment with it, you know?” He takes another bite, eyes on the TV. Swallows. Says, “You gotta be my taste tester, tell me how it compares.”

He can see Cas smiling at him in his peripheral vision. “Of course,” Cas says.

\--

Dean wakes the next morning to find that Cas has dozed off half sitting up on the other bed, still on top of the covers, head lolling to the side. He stands there longer than he means to before he finally huffs a laugh at himself and heads to the bathroom to get ready for another day of working the case.

\--

“You’re not going to believe this,” Dean says as Cas emerges from the bathroom. Cas makes his way over, stands behind Dean to look at his screen.

On a whim, Dean had Googled “Utah urban legends,” and there, item number six on the first damn page that popped up, were a handful of lines about a supposed curse falling upon people who brought home pieces of petrified wood from a nearby state park.

They do a little digging and, sure enough, they find out that all of the victims had visited the park within days of their deaths. After that, it’s just a few tedious days of tracking down and destroying the pieces of wood. They find the last one just over the border into Colorado, and then they’re done.

They celebrate with dinner at Bin 707 Foodbar, both of them ordering the Bin Burger, medium. (Dean had grinned reading the menu. “Cooked medium (hot pink center) or well done; other temperatures politely declined,” he read aloud, earning him a smile from Cas in response.) They make it most of the way through their meal before Cas says casually, dipping a fry into his aioli, “So, Sam told me Max and Alicia are staying at the bunker now.”

Dean rubs his hands on his jeans. “Yeah,” he says. “It just kind of uh. Happened.” Cas picks up another fry, doesn’t say anything, so Dean continues, “It’s nice to be able to give them a home, you know? Things got kinda screwed up for them when their mom died. And it only makes sense with Sam’s grand plan, right? Gotta have some people at the center so they can go where they’re needed.”

“Right,” Cas says. “It’s only practical.” He shoves another fry in his mouth.

Dean frowns. “Yeah, I guess,” he says. He watches Cas silently eat another fry, shifts in his seat. “Anyway, the bunker is really suited to it, you know? I swear it just expands to fit whoever we need, like there’s always another room available for anyone who wants to stay.”

“Mmm,” Cas says.

“Except the kitchen,” Dean says, leaning forward, elbows on the table. Cas looks up at him, squinting. “With you and my mom coming over for dinner, that makes seven of us. Figure we can set up in the library, use it like a fancy dining room.”

“That sounds like fun,” Cas says slowly.

Dean grins. “It’s gonna be great,” he says, and Cas smiles back.

\--

Dean starts brainstorming ideas for pizzas as soon as he gets back to the bunker. He finally has all the details planned out and is getting ready to pick a day, to start letting everybody know when to be home, when Sam pops into his room and says, “Hey, got a case up in Wisconsin near where mom’s at that looks like a two person job. You cool to go help out?”

“Oh,” Dean says. He sighs, closes his laptop. “Yeah.”

“If you’re busy--”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Dean says. “Really. What’re we looking at?”

\--

Two days later Dean is sneaking into a graveyard with Mary based on a tip from a couple of spooked college kids whose reliability Dean seriously doubts. They had insisted they saw the fabled Rhinelander Hodag, which Dean had Googled and learned was supposedly a creature with a frog’s head, an elephant’s face, and a dinosaur’s spiky back that could only be killed by chloroform, dynamite, or, inexplicably, lemons. Sam’s system put forth the much more reasonable theory of “black dog.” Dean rolled his eyes, put a lot more stock in the latter, and packed up his gun and his angel blade.

Mary has gone around the back, circling around the fence. Dean is slowly picking his way amongst the headstones, leaning to peer around a mausoleum, when suddenly his legs are swept out from under him and his gun is kicked away, sent skittering across the concrete and into the grass. Someone twists his arm and pins him to the ground, the barrel of a gun pressed against the back of his head.

“Okay,” he says, keeping his voice low, steady. “Let’s just stay calm and--”

Everything shifts slightly, the pressure on his back and the grip on his arm letting up a little, the gun moving, mercifully, away from his head.

“Dean?” the person pinning him says, their voice familiar.

Dean squints in the dark, though it doesn’t do him much good. After a moment it clicks, and he says, “Holy shit. Krissy?” She lets him up, and as Dean stands, dusting himself off, he says, “Fuck, lost track of you for ages there.”

Krissy punches him in the arm. “You lost your phone, asshole.”

“Hey, ow!” Dean says, rubbing his arm, then, “And keep it down, all right, there’s a--”

“It’s not here,” Krissy says. “I’ve already been through this whole place. Looks like it’s moved on to haunt some other creepy graveyard.”

“Oh,” Dean says. “Well, in that case. Regroup over dinner?”

Krissy considers him for a second, then nods. “Yeah, all right,” she says.

“Cool,” Dean says, grinning. As they head out of the graveyard, he pulls his phone from his pocket, blinking in the light from the screen.

Krissy glances over at him, raises an eyebrow. “What’re you doing?”

“Calling my mom,” Dean says. He hooks a thumb over his shoulder with one hand as he holds his phone to his ear with the other. “She’s working the hunt with me, went around back.”

“Wow,” Krissy says. “You’re even lamer than I remember.”

\--

When they meet up with Mary a few minutes later, Krissy takes one look at her, raises an eyebrow, and says, “There’s no way this is your mom.”

Dean rolls his eyes. “Like I said. We’ll explain over dinner.”

Mary introduces herself while Dean pulls out his phone. He lucks out with a Yelp search -- the Tomahawk Room in Chippewa Falls is basically the only place still open at this hour, but it’s just fifteen minutes away and has a 4.5 star rating. Dean looks at it, excited, and then looks at Krissy and says, “Wait, you’re not-- wait. You _are_ old enough to go to bars. Holy shit.”

Krissy rolls her eyes. “I’ll meet you there, grandpa.”

\--

Dean and Mary start on their explanation as they sip their beers, but then their jalapeno cheese stuffed pretzels arrive and all conversation stops as they dig in. Dean pauses only when Krissy says, “Dude, gross.”

“What?” Dean mumbles around a mouthful of food.

Krissy looks over at Mary. She says, “Has he always been like this?”

Mary sighs fondly, if a bit melodramatically. “Unfortunately.”

Krissy shakes her head. “Maybe you lucked out on missing all those years of family meals if this is what you would have been subjected to.”

Dean stops chewing, tenses, looks up at his mom in time for her look of shock to melt into laughter. “Oh, I like her, Dean,” she says. “I can’t believe you never mentioned her before.”

Mary and Dean finish giving a basic overview of everything that’s happened as they finish their food -- saving the world, Mary coming back, the bunker, the Men of Letters. The usual. Krissy listens with rapt attention until they’re done, and then they turn their attention on her.

“So, Krissy,” Mary says. “You were born into this?”

Krissy shakes her head. “Nah. May as well have been, though. My mom was killed when I was pretty young, and my dad got into hunting after that. He tried to get out of the life eventually, but…” She shrugs. “Didn’t exactly work out for him.”

“Yeah, about that,” Dean says. “What happened to...what was it you said last time I saw you? Something about not going looking for monsters?”

Krissy’s face goes carefully blank. “Yeah, guess that didn’t work out, either.”

“I can see that,” Dean says.

She looks directly at him, tilts her chin up. “You gonna try telling me to stop?”

“Nah,” Dean says. “I’m not your dad.”

“Wow,” Krissy says. “Character development.”

“Shut up,” Dean says, rolling his eyes, downing the rest of his beer.

\--

“Listen,” Dean says as they’re heading out to their cars. “I don’t know what your situation is, but if you want, you’re welcome in the bunker. We’ve got plenty of rooms and great showers and the wifi always works, so…”

“Well, I need to finish this hunt,” Krissy says, and then she hesitates, chewing her lip, before she looks up directly at Dean and says, “and then I’d have to talk to my girlfriend.”

“Oh,” Dean says. “What?”

“You remember Josephine, right?” Krissy says.

“Yeah,” Dean says. “Yeah, of course. You’re, uh.” He clears his throat. “You’re. Dating?”

Krissy leans on one leg, crosses her arms. “That a problem?”

“No,” Dean says. “No, of course not. You’re both welcome.”

Krissy relaxes slightly. “All right,” she says. “Cool.”

A few beats of silence pass before Mary says, “Is she not a hunter?”

“No, she is,” Krissy says, then looks down, grimaces. “We usually hunt together, you know? But she twisted her ankle the last hunt we were on, and this one couldn’t really wait, so…” She trails off, shrugging.

“Well,” Mary says, “looks like this is a bust for tonight, anyway. Let’s get some rest and then we can wrap this up tomorrow?”

Krissy looks up, relaxes a little more. “Yeah,” she says. “That sounds great.”

\--

Two days and a few sweaty hours later, Dean and Mary are back at the bunker with Krissy and Josephine in tow, all set up in a room of their own. They clear out another room while they’re at it, reasoning they can always use the extra space for Mary or whoever else filters through.

Dean sits next to his mom in the library afterwards, nursing a beer. He says, “Hey, if you wanna stick around for a couple days, we could have that dinner I was talking about.”

Mary smiles at him, says, “I’d love that.”

Dean texts everyone else that day, checks in to see how everything is going. Max and Alicia are already on their way back; Sam and Eileen think they’ll wrap their hunt up that night and be back at the bunker the following evening. Dean chews his lip for a minute and then he texts Cas, **hey, u free 2 nights from now?**

Cas’ reply comes just a few minutes later: **I can be. What do you need?**

**i owe u some homemade pizza. family dinner. u in?**

**Of course,** comes Cas’ reply. **I’ll be there.**

\--

Dean heads into town later that afternoon. As he wanders the aisles, he has to think carefully about it, add up everyone in his head -- mom, Max, Alicia, Krissy and Josephine, Sam and Eileen, himself and--

He nearly bumps into another customer with his cart, mumbles an apology as he waits for them to pass.

By the time he gets back to the bunker with everything he needs for the pizza plus some basics for the next few days, Max and Alicia’s car is in its usual space in the garage. The bunker is quiet, though, as he makes his way inside and down the stairs. It takes him two trips to get everything to the kitchen, and it’s only when he’s halfway through putting everything away that Josephine wanders in.

“Dibs,” she says by way of greeting, grabbing the container of peanut butter chocolate ice cream directly out of Dean’s hand.

“Hello to you, too,” Dean says. “Max and Alicia made it back okay?”

“Yeah,” Josephine says, opening and closing a few of the drawers before she finds the right one and grabs a couple of spoons. “Just resting up.” She pulls out her phone as she goes to sit at the table, taps at the screen, holds it to her face. After a moment, she says, “Hey, come to the kitchen, Dean bought Haagen Dazs. ...I know, right? You better hurry.” She hangs up.

Dean stops what he’s doing to raise an eyebrow at her. “Did you really just call Krissy while in the same house as her?” he asks.

“What?” Josephine says, pulling the lid off the container. “It’s a big bunker.”

Dean rolls his eyes and returns to putting the groceries away. He doesn’t turn around when Krissy wanders in, just silently restocks their kitchen as Krissy and Josephine sit side by side, sharing ice cream straight from the container, having a conversation too quiet for him to hear.

\--

Later that night, after everyone else has retreated to their own space, Dean opens the door to Cas’ usual room. He changes out the sheets so they’ll be fresh, dusts off the nightstand and the shelves, sweeps the floor. It’s only once it’s in perfect shape that he goes to his own room and gets ready for bed.

\--

Sam and Eileen make it back the next afternoon, and for the entire rest of the day, no matter what Dean does or where he goes, there’s the sound of people: Sam catching up with Josephine and Krissy, showing them around the war room; Mary and Alicia sitting in the library, cleaning their guns, sharpening their knives, making more salt rounds; Eileen and Max hunched over a book in the kitchen, working out the details of a new spell.

Dean smiles at the sight. He opens his phone and texts Cas, **still on for tomorrow, right?**

Cas texts back, **Of course.**

\--

Dean is in the middle of cooking when Cas arrives.

“Dean,” Cas says from behind him. “I just wanted to let you know I’m here.”

Dean turns from his cooking to find Cas hovering in the doorway. “Hey,” he says, grinning. “You say hi to everyone already?”

“Yes,” Cas says. “I was…”

“Accosted?” Dean says.

“I was going to say ‘introduced,’” Cas says, smiling.

Dean laughs. “Came here to retreat, huh?”

Cas huffs a laugh, too. “Something like that,” he says, coming down the steps into the kitchen. “Do you need any help?”

“Nah, I’ve got it,” Dean says. “But if you wanna hang out here, I won’t complain.” He gestures to the island. “If you sit here, you can be my taste tester.”

Cas nods and comes to perch on one of the stools while Dean finishes up the few different sauces he’s trying -- a standard tomato sauce, a pesto, a garlic parmesan one. If Cas’ reactions are any indication, their first family dinner is going to be a huge success.

\--

They take up both tables in the library, talking as they eat, figuring out how they’re connected to one another, sharing the stories they’ve heard about each other. Cas signs back and forth with Sam and Eileen, Mary leaning in to watch and listen, all of them stopping now and then to teach her new signs. Krissy, Josephine, Max, and Alicia sit crowded around their table, leaning in towards one another, sharing something called “memes.” They pass their phones back and forth, laughing, Josephine pausing to remark, “How is there even wifi in this place?”

“Magic,” Dean says, and Max and Alicia roll their eyes in unison.

Dean leans back in his chair as they return to their phones. He looks around at his family crowded around the tables, smiles as their voices wash over him.

\--

They disperse once dinner is over and the tables have been cleared, everyone returning to their own corner of the bunker to relax. Cas is the last one in the kitchen, watching as Dean puts the rest of the plates into the dishwasher and dries his hands.

“Well, uh--” Dean says, at the same time Cas says, “Well, I--”

Dean grins. “You first,” he says.

“Well,” Cas says, “I better be going.”

A few seconds of silence stretch between them. Finally, Dean swallows. He looks away from Cas and says, “Oh, okay. Uh. Thanks for coming, man.”

Cas nods, says his goodbye, and walks away.

“I’m a fucking idiot,” Dean says to the empty kitchen, after he’s gone.

\--

Dean gets up early the next day and asks Sam for a hunt.

“I don’t have any,” Sam says.

“You can’t be serious.”

Sam shrugs. “That big rush of hunts?” he says. “That was our backlog. There are other hunters out there finishing up the last of it, and from here on out, we’re really just gonna be dealing with new stuff as it comes up.”

“Oh,” Dean says. “That’s great.”

He retreats to his room, grabbing his laptop and sitting on his bed. He spends a few hours browsing the news, running a few searches, taking notes as he goes. He has three possible hunts in mind by the time he heads back out into the bunker to track Sam down.

“Hey,” Dean says when he finds him, “I found a hunt over in Louisiana. Looks like it might be a--”

“Rugaru?” Sam says, not looking up from his sandwich, and Dean’s heart sinks. “Yeah, Eileen has some friends down there who are taking care of it.”

“Okay,” Dean says. “Well, there’s also something that looks like a possible salt and burn up north--”

“Claire and Tracy are on it,” Sam says.

Dean sighs. “So, the potential siren in Florida…?”

“Already taken care of as of--” Sam pulls out his phone, glances at the time-- “nine hours ago.”

“And there’s nothing else at all?”

“Not right now, no,” Sam says. “Dean, just enjoy it, will you? Relax. Do something fun. That was the whole point.”

“Yeah,” Dean says. “Yeah, okay.”

Dean wanders back down the hall and into his room. He paces back and forth, pulls his phone out of his pocket and taps it against his forehead, puts it away. Rearranges the books on his shelf. Straightens the weapons hanging on his wall.

Finally, he sits on his bed and pulls out his phone again. He brings up Cas’ contact info and hits call.

“Hello, Dean,” Cas says.

“Hey,” Dean says. “Wanna go see a movie?”

\--

As it turns out, Cas has only made it as far as Junction City. Dean makes the drive in time for them to catch the three o’clock showing of _Wonder Woman._

Cas waits patiently as Dean makes his way through the concession line, douses his popcorn in butter and salt. They take a seat near the front, talking as they wait for the movie to start.

“So,” Dean says, leaning the popcorn towards Cas in offering, “found any lives to save since yesterday?”

Cas reaches into the container, plucks out a piece of popcorn, pops it into his mouth and chews thoughtfully. “Actually, yes,” he says. “There was a young man this morning whose dog had been hit by a car.” He glances up at the screen, takes another few pieces of popcorn. “And I suppose it wasn’t life-threatening, but there was a small girl who skinned her knees outside the theater before you arrived. And--” He stops, frowning as he looks down at his hand where it hovers over the popcorn.

“And?” Dean says.

“I don’t understand why I keep reaching for this,” Cas says. “I’m not hungry. And pieces keep getting stuck in my teeth.”

Dean laughs. “I don’t think anyone has the answer to that one,” he says.

Cas narrows his eyes at the popcorn as the lights in the theater dim. As the previews start to play, he grabs another handful.

\--

Dean scrolls Yelp as the credits roll, grimacing when he sees that none of the bars in town manage to break four stars. Still, he turns to Cas and says, “You up for some dinner? This place is decently rated and the burgers look pretty good. It’s not even five minutes from here.”

Fifteen minutes later, they’re sitting at a corner table with drinks in hand, both of them passing on dinner and blaming the popcorn.

“So,” Dean says, taking a sip of his beer. “What’d you think of the movie?”

Cas considers it for a moment, frowning down at his drink. “I liked it,” he says. “But it was foolish, what Diana did. Leaving her home like that when she had no idea what was waiting for her in the world.”

“No way,” Dean says. “C’mon, it was brave as hell and you know it.”

“The two aren’t mutually exclusive,” Cas says, smiling slightly. “But anyone hoping to end all war is going to be perpetually disappointed.”

Dean takes another drink, shrugging. “Doesn’t hurt to hope, though, right? I mean, hell, I never thought we’d be fresh out of hunts, but here we are, all caught up on our backlog.”

“Oh?” Cas says, tilting his head at Dean when he nods. “I didn’t know. That’s wonderful.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, grinning at him. “Sounds like we’re gonna have a lot more time to just do--” he gestures widely with one arm-- “whatever we want.”

Cas goes still, smile fading. He looks at Dean levelly and asks, “What are you doing here, Dean?”

Something in Dean’s stomach twists, but he keeps a smile plastered on his face as he says, “Well, we just saw a movie, and now we’re having drinks.”

Cas sighs. “Dean.”

“What?”

“I’m being serious.”

“So am I,” Dean says, but Cas continues to frown at him. Dean shifts in his seat. “I don’t know what you want from me, man.”

“The truth.”

Dean throws up a hand. “The truth about what?”

“Why you’re here,” Cas says. Dean opens his mouth, but Cas silences him with a raised hand. “Is there a case?”

“What?” Dean asks, his own smile finally fading, too. He shakes his head, brow furrowed. “No. There’s no case, I just told you--”

“Did something happen?” Cas asks insistently. “Is Sam all right?”

“No, man, Sam is--” Dean takes a deep breath, bounces his leg under the table. “Everyone is fine.”

“Then what do you need?”

“I don’t-- I don’t need anything.” Cas narrows his eyes, so Dean taps the side of his glass, tries to smile again. He says, “Maybe a refill.”

Cas stares at him. “If you’re uncomfortable,” he says, voice flat, “you can go.”

Dean’s leg stills. “Cas, what the fuck?” he asks. “I thought we were having a good time.”

Cas hesitates, looks away, down at his glass. He runs a finger along the rim. “I was,” he says miserably.

Dean throws one hand up, lets it fall back to the table. “So what went wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Cas says.

Dean simply looks at Cas for a few long moments. Finally, he says, “Hang on.” Cas doesn’t look up as Dean stands and tracks down their waiter, pays their bill before returning to the table. “C’mon,” he says, tapping Cas on the arm with the back of his hand.

Cas obliges, leaves his half-finished drink and follows Dean back out to the parking lot. He moves towards his truck at first, but Dean stops him, says, “No, come with me.” He gets into the driver’s side of the Impala as Cas slides into the passenger seat, and once they’ve both settled in and closed the doors behind them, he says, “Talk to me.”

Cas says, frowning, “About what?”

“About anything,” Dean says, shrugging. “About whatever’s on your mind.”

Cas looks down at his hands. Dean waits patiently as they sit in silence for a few minutes, until, finally, Cas turns to look out the window and says, “I’ve been thinking about being...in-between.”

“In-between what?” Dean says.

“Just...in-between, in general,” Cas says. “For instance. Not being quite angel enough for heaven. But maybe not human enough for Earth, either.” He glances over at Dean, then back down. “Not knowing quite where I stand.”

“Well, hey,” Dean says gently, “that’s not a bad thing. It just means you’re special.”

Cas smiles softly. “That’s a very generous way of putting it,” he says. “Thank you.”

“Any time,” Dean says, warmth spreading through his chest. “And anyway, for what it’s worth, I think you’ve got a pretty good claim on Earth.”

Cas turns to look at him. “How do you figure?”

Dean shrugs. “There are pieces of you all over the country, you know? A little of your grace in every person you’ve healed. That’s awesome.”

“If that’s the case,” Cas says, “you must have a pretty good claim, too.” At Dean’s questioning _hmm,_ he continues, “There are pieces of you all over the country, too. With all the people you’ve helped, every life you touched.”

Dean smiles, half his mouth quirking up. “Yeah, suppose so.”

Cas turns again, rests his arm against the door, fingers tracing over the chrome. He takes a deep breath, lets it out in a rush. “How do you figure out where you belong,” he says quietly, “when there are pieces of you all over the country?”

Dean stares at Cas’ profile, watches the movement of his hand. “I dunno,” he says. “Figure out where the biggest piece is and go there, I guess.”

\--

Dean hasn’t even been back at the bunker for twenty-four hours before he gets restless.

He gets up from his desk, grabbing a blank notepad from a drawer before heading farther down the hallway, pulling open the door to one of the larger rooms they haven’t bothered to clear out yet.

He spends the morning moving boxes, dumping them in other rooms and turning away everyone who stops by with an offer of help. He allows himself thirty minutes for lunch and then returns to work, spends the afternoon measuring the room, sketching out a diagram, making notes, searching craigslist on his laptop.

By the next morning, he has a plan. **hey,** he texts Cas. **you busy?**

Cas’ reply comes less than a minute later: **No.**

 **sweet,** Dean responds. **in that case come to the bunker I need your truck.**

\--

A few hours and fifty dollars later, Dean and Cas are carefully maneuvering a couch off the back of Cas’ truck, down the stairs, past the sound of voices floating down the hallway from the kitchen, and towards the soon-to-be family room. Cas is unfazed by the endeavor, but by the time they’ve set the couch down exactly where Dean wants it, he needs a breather.

Dean collapses onto the couch, sinking into the cushions with a sigh. “I wanna get some chairs, too,” he says, as Cas takes a seat next to him. “Maybe a coffee table. And we’ll need a bigger TV if we all wanna be able to see the screen.” He gestures at the walls. Cas looks up, follows the movement of his hand. “And maybe we should put up some pictures or something. The plain cement is bumming me out.”

“It sounds like quite the project,” Cas says. Dean nods, and Cas looks at him, brow furrowed. “No one else offered to help you with this?”

Dean freezes. “You know,” he says, “if you’re too busy--” he stands up-- “if you’ve got somewhere better to be-- just go, don’t hang around for my sake.” Cas is already saying his name in that placating way he has, but Dean ignores it. He strides down the hallway and into his room, closing and locking the door behind him. He puts on his headphones and ignores the knocks he can hear even through his music.

\--

Dean waits until the knocking stops, then waits another hour for good measure. It’s only then that he takes off his headphones and gets up, ignoring the ache in his chest as he opens his door, walks to the kitchen. He finds Alicia and Josephine sitting at the table with an assortment of electronics spread across it -- a laptop that’s been half disassembled, a bag of tools, piles of spare parts.

“Gonna leave any room for the rest of us?” Dean mutters as he grabs a beer from the fridge.

Josephine raises an eyebrow. “We were here first,” she says. “Go be surly in the library.”

Dean scoffs as he heads down the hallway. “Wow,” he mutters to himself, “I can’t believe, in my own house--”

He stops dead in his tracks as soon as he steps into the library. There Cas is, sitting at the table with his laptop in front of him. He looks up when Dean stops.

Dean stands there, swallowing hard, neither of them saying anything.

Eventually, Cas shifts in his seat. “I found some chairs that I think might match the couch,” he says. He pulls one of the other chairs back from the table, slides it closer to himself, looks up at Dean expectantly.

Dean takes a deep breath. “Oh yeah?” he says, moving to sit next to Cas, look at what he’s found.

\--

Sam appears in the doorway at almost the exact instant they finish arranging the chairs on either side of the couch. “Hey,” he says, “a couple hunts popped up while you guys were gone. Max and Alicia are headed off to take care of one, you guys mind taking the other?”

“Sure,” Dean says, as Cas says, “Of course, Sam.”

It’s a simple case -- a rawhead just a few hours from the bunker. It’s over and done in a few hours, but by the time they’ve put it down and Cas has healed up the kids the rawhead had captured, they’re both exhausted.

“Drive back, then dinner?” Dean says. “I’ll make you something better than anything you can find on Yelp, and then we can crash.” He drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “Your room’s still set up for you, y’know.”

Cas nods as he leans his head against the window. Dean turns the key in the ignition and tries not to smile.

\--

Dean wakes to shouting, to footsteps pounding down the hallway.

He’s out of bed and following the noise before he even has time to wake up all the way. He finds everyone in the war room, the scene before him shifting him suddenly into alertness. Max is laid out on the table, breath coming in pained bursts from between his teeth. Alicia is holding onto him and whispering soothingly, blood trailing from where Max lays all the way across the floor and up the stairs. Josephine is standing off to the side, arms wrapped around Krissy, whose face is buried in her shoulder.

Cas is there, too, standing next to Max, and as Dean approaches, the blue-white glow of Cas’ grace appears underneath his hands, spreads until Max’s bloody torso is wreathed in light.

From behind him, Dean hears more footsteps approaching. “Holy shit,” Sam says. “What happened?”

Dean ignores him. He stands next to Cas, instead, looks down at Max and says, keeping his voice light, “Hey, you wanted to see what he can do firsthand, right?”

Max manages a pained, shaky smile as he nods.

Sam and Eileen make their way over, standing on Cas’ other side as Max’s skin knits back together. When it’s done and the glow fades, Dean claps his hand on Cas’ shoulder. “Thank God,” he says.

Cas huffs a sound of acknowledgement, eyes unfocused, right before he passes out.

“Woah, hey,” Dean says, catching Cas under one arm as Sam holds him up on the other side.

Dean looks at Cas, swallowing, then looks back at Max. He’s breathing normally, now, and is starting to sit up with Alicia’s help. “I’m good,” Max says. He gestures towards the hallway with his head.

Dean nods, then looks over at Sam. Sam looks at Eileen, who says quietly, “Go on.” She tilts her head towards Josephine and Krissy. “I’ll make sure they’re okay.”

Sam nods, satisfied, and without a word, he and Dean half-carry, half-drag Cas out of the room, down the hallway and to his room.

“Thanks,” Dean says, once they deposit Cas on his bed. “I got it from here.”

Once Sam has left, Dean pulls Cas’ armchair over by the bed, sits down heavily. He runs his fingers through his hair, sits with his head in his hand as he watches the slow rise and fall of Cas’ chest.

\--

Dean wakes with a crick in his neck, blearily trying and failing to sit up. After a few moments of fruitless struggling, he realizes the source of his difficulties: Someone placed a blanket over him while he was sleeping.

He rubs at his eyes as he finally manages to right himself, looking over at the now-empty bed as he blinks the rest of the way awake. He rolls his head from side to side, breathes through the tightness in his chest, and gets up.

Dean walks down the hallway, pausing in the doorway as he reaches the kitchen. The kids are all there, crowded around the table. Cas is there, too, sitting across from Max. His clothes are still rumpled from sleeping in them and there are dark circles under his eyes. A nearly empty mug of coffee sits in front of him. Max has one of his spell kits spread on the table -- pieces of fabric and stuffing, small bundles of twigs and herbs, pins in various sizes. As Dean watches, Max pricks his finger with one of his pins, then holds it out across the table. Cas reaches out, and as he touches their fingertips together, there’s a tiny flash of grace and the blood on Max’s finger disappears.

“Okay, okay, enough,” Dean says, rolling his eyes as he walks into the room. “First of all, I’m glad to see you’ve recovered so quickly from your brush with death. And second, Cas isn’t here to perform morbid parlor tricks for you.”

Max pulls back his hand, laughing as Dean starts making his way over to the cupboards to find something to eat. “If you want him to perform tricks just for you, you’re gonna have to actually make a move,” Max says, “and if you don’t, maybe I will.”

The kids do a piss poor job suppressing their laughter, and as Dean tries to ignore the flush creeping up his neck, he runs into the edge of the island with his hip, stubs his foot on the corner. He tries to catch himself and only partially succeeds, stumbling forward and smashing his face into the counter.

“God _fucking_ dammit,” Dean says as he stands, bracing one hand against the counter and reaching up to his face with the other. He touches his nose gingerly, and when he pulls back his hand, it comes away bloody.

A hush falls over the room, only broken by Max saying, “Oh shit, Dean, I--” as Dean storms out of the kitchen.

He holds his hand beneath his nose as he makes his way down the hallway and into the bathroom. Blood drips down his face and over the back of his palm as he looks at himself in the mirror, trying to assess whether his nose is broken.

Dean curses under his breath as he grabs a towel and presses it to his face. He takes a seat on one of the benches lining the wall and prays for the bleeding to stop.

His nose is still stubbornly refusing to cooperate by the time Cas appears a few minutes later. He frowns at Dean as he strides over, reaching out and saying, “Dean, let me.”

Dean shifts away, dodging Cas’ hand. Cas’ face falls for a moment, but then he takes a deep breath, schools it into something more neutral. He pulls his hand back and sits down next to Dean instead.

“Are you…” Cas starts. He stops, closes his eyes, runs a hand down over his face before settling it back on his lap. He opens his eyes again, but he doesn’t look at Dean as he asks, “Are you angry with me?”

“What?” Dean says. “No. Why would I be?”

“I’m not trying to pry,” Cas says carefully, “but. Even when I’m trying not to, I can...feel it sometimes, what you’re feeling. Or get a sense of it, at least. And so much of the time, you seem…” Cas sighs. Dean clamps his free hand down against the edge of the bench as his heart starts to race. “I don’t know,” Cas continues. “Sometimes you seem so unhappy, and I don’t understand what I’ve done to--”

“It’s not--” Dean hisses in pain, drops his voice lower, tries not to move his face as much when he talks-- “it isn’t like that. You haven’t done anything.”

Cas’ mouth twists. “Then what is it like?”

“It’s--” Dean says. “It’s complicated.”

“So you’ve said.”

“I know.”

“So explain it to me.”

Dean lifts one shoulder in a half shrug. “I’m not unhappy,” he says. “I just. I dunno.”

Cas sighs. “I can’t tell what you’re feeling now, either,” he says. “I can feel it, I just don’t understand it. You don’t seem to be...enjoying this. This is why I was trying to stay away-- to do us both a favor. But you don’t seem happy about that, either.”

Dean swallows hard, looks down at the floor. “Of course I’m not.”

Cas turns to stare at Dean as he continues to hold the towel to his face. “Then why are you so...whatever it is you’re feeling when I’m around?”

“I dunno,” Dean says, picking at a loose thread near his knee. “I mean. We’ll be hanging out and having a good time or whatever, but there’s always that-- that moment where I realize this is temporary, or that I’m gonna screw it up somehow, or that you don’t want the same thing I want--”

“Which is what?” Cas interrupts.

“What?” Dean says, stomach flipping.

Cas sighs again. “What is it that you want from me, Dean?”

Dean is silent for a long moment, jaw working. Finally, he says, voice muffled by the towel, “I want this.”

“A broken nose,” Cas says wryly, “and a long overdue conversation conducted in a bathroom?”

Dean snorts, immediately regretting it. “Fucking. Ow,” he says, wincing. “I dunno,” he continues, once the pain fades. “I guess I figured once all the world-ending stuff was over, you’d come stay here with us. But then you just. Didn’t.”

“Why didn’t you ask?” Cas says.

Dean heaves a sigh. “I didn’t want you to come here just because it was what I wanted, I guess? I mean, if you wanted to go back to heaven or whatever. I didn’t wanna be the one to stop you.”

Cas stares at the side of Dean’s face, frowning. “I haven’t been welcome in heaven in a long time, Dean.”

“Yeah, well,” Dean says, “you’re always welcome here.”

Cas continues staring at him, the silence stretching out long enough that finally Dean says, “Listen, I’m not a mindreader, so. What’re you thinking.”

“I think,” Cas says solemnly, “that we’ve both been dumbasses.”

Dean laughs, groaning when another spike of pain shoots through his face. He grinds his teeth for a few seconds, and once he recovers, he says, “You won’t hear me arguing.”

Cas huffs a laugh, and then he says, “Dean.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, looking up.

Cas is watching him, still, but something in his face has softened, now. Quietly, he asks, “do you know what I want?”

“No,” Dean admits.

Cas hesitates, looks at the towel still pressed against Dean’s face and then back up. As he meets Dean’s gaze, he says, “I can show you?”

Dean’s heart is racing, but he nods.

Cas shifts towards Dean on the bench, reaching up to gently take the towel and pull it away from Dean’s face. He touches the tips of his fingers to Dean’s cheek, and Dean closes his eyes as Cas’ grace flows into him, fixing his nose, cleaning off the blood. Dean sighs in relief, murmuring his thanks.

Cas doesn’t remove his hand once he’s done, though. Instead, he tentatively slides his fingers so he’s cupping Dean’s cheek, and then he leans in the last few inches and presses a kiss to the corner of Dean’s mouth, quick and warm. He runs his thumb gently over Dean’s skin as Dean takes a shaky breath.

Finally, Dean opens his eyes to find Cas smiling softly at him. He hesitates for only a moment before turning the rest of the way towards Cas.

This time, Dean is the one who leans in and catches Cas’ lips with his own.

\--

When they finally make their way back to the kitchen, they find the blood cleaned up off the floor and breakfast waiting for them on the table -- eggs and toast, bacon and hashbrowns, coffee and orange juice. Everyone tenses when they appear, relaxing only once Dean says, “Uh. We’re, um. We’re cool.”

“So,” Max says, as Dean and Cas join everyone at the table, “did you bone?”

Alicia smacks him in the arm, rolls her eyes as he laughs. “What he _means_ is did you work everything out?”

Dean glances over at Cas. “Um,” he says, fighting a smile in spite of the fact that his face is burning. “I guess you could say that.”

“Aw,” Krissy says, grabbing a piece of bacon. “They grow up so fast.”

\--

They find a coffee table on Craigslist, and a couple side tables, too, so everyone will have a place to put their drinks. They have to drive a few hours for it, but they even manage to get a decent TV. They pile everything into Cas’ truck and haul it back to the bunker.

Everyone pitches in to get the room the rest of the way set up, but they disappear one by one as the work tapers off, leaving Dean and Cas to complete the finishing touches themselves.

Dean dusts his hands on his jeans, takes a quick look around the room. Satisfied, he sits on the couch, leans his head back against the cushion and closes his eyes. Cas sits down next to him, pressed up against his side. Dean feels overwarm, heart racing, but this time, instead of moving away, Cas takes Dean’s hand in his own.

Dean smiles. He shifts his hand and laces their fingers together.

\--

They get ready for bed at the same time, making it all the way through going to the bathroom, brushing their teeth, washing their faces. As they reach the door to Dean’s bedroom, Cas grabs Dean by the hand, turns him around, and kisses him right there in the hallway. Dean smiles into it, kisses him back.

When Cas pulls away, he’s smiling, too. He says, “Good night, Dean.”

Something tugs at Dean’s chest. “Uh. Yeah,” Dean says, letting go of Cas’ hand. “G’night, Cas.” He turns to go into his room.

“Dean,” Cas says from behind him, touching his wrist. Dean stops and turns back around, looking at the floor. Cas considers him for a moment, frowning. He says, gently, “Tell me what you’re feeling.”

Dean keeps looking down as he rubs a hand across the back of his neck. “Uh,” he says. He clears his throat. “I guess I just hoped that. I dunno. That you wouldn’t need a separate room any more. I mean. Unless that’s not what you--”

“Dean,” Cas interrupts, sighing. When Dean looks up, Cas takes his face in his hands and kisses him again. He steps forward, forcing Dean to move backwards, step after step, until they’re both inside Dean’s room. Cas kicks the door closed behind them.

\--

They settle into a routine. They go on hunts as needed, they hang out around the bunker, they learn how to exist in the same space from day to day. Just as Dean feels like maybe he’s getting the hang of the new turn his life has taken, Cas gets a call.

“Hello?” Cas says, and at whatever answer he gets, he frowns. “How did you get this number? ...Why? ...I’ll think about it and be in touch.” He sets his phone on the table after he hangs up and stares at it, brow furrowed.

“Who was that?” Dean asks.

“One of my brothers,” Cas says.

“I thought you, uh,” Dean says. “Weren’t on good terms?”

“We aren’t,” Cas says. “But they’re extending an olive branch, I think. And...I think I want to take it.”

Dean stares at him for a long moment, something hot and ugly spreading through his chest, up his throat. “Okay,” he manages, eventually.

Cas sighs. He says, “Clearly it isn’t.”

Dean scrubs a hand down over his face, takes a deep breath. “I dunno, man,” he says. “You said all that stuff about not being welcome in heaven, and I just-- I guess I just thought--”

“That what?” Cas snaps. “I’d stop caring entirely? That once I started staying here, I’d never leave, even temporarily?”

Dean flushes. “No, of course not,” he says. “I just. I don’t trust those assholes, man. You at least gotta let me come with you--”

“Yes, because that went so well last time,” Cas says, rolling his eyes. “Have you already forgotten what happened with Ishim--”

“I haven’t forgotten,” Dean says, “which is exactly why I don’t want you to go through with this.”

“It isn’t your choice to make,” Cas says.

Dean scoffs. “So, what, I don’t even get a say?”

“No,” Cas says, “it’s not that, it’s--”

“It’s what, Cas?” Dean says, leaning back in his chair, crossing his arms.

“Dean,” Cas says, closing his eyes, leaning with his elbows on the table, his head in his hands. “Can we please just-- I know you’re upset, and it’s just making it harder to-- to--”

“Damn right i’m upset,” Dean says, “I--”

“No, I mean I can feel it,” Cas says, voice strained. “Can we-- can we please--”

“Oh,” Dean says, mouth snapping shut.

He closes his eyes. As they sit in silence for a few minutes, he uncrosses his arms, takes a few deep breaths. Tries to take a step back. Once his breathing has slowed, his heart rate returned to normal, he says, softer, “I guess I just don’t get why you still want to give them the benefit of the doubt, after...after everything.”

“Because they’re my family,” Cas says quietly, lifting his head from his hands, opening his eyes. “What you said before, about leaving pieces of myself across the country. The largest piece will always be here--” he taps his fingers against the kitchen table-- “but there will always be pieces of me with them, too.” Grimacing, he adds, “Like it or not.”

Dean sighs. “Yeah, okay, I get it,” he says, looking down at his knees. “I don’t trust them, but I get it. And--” he looks up at Cas-- “I trust you. So. If you say you gotta go, and that it’s gonna be fine, I believe that.”

In response, Cas reaches out, gently touches Dean’s hand. “I’ll call you to let you know I got there safely,” he says.

Dean nods. He picks up Cas’ hand and lifts it to his face, presses a kiss to his knuckles.

\--

Dean is restless while Cas is gone. He does what he can to channel his anxious energy into something useful -- cooking meals for everyone, sorting through the boxes they’d unceremoniously shoved into storage when they cleaned out the bedrooms, going down to the shooting range with the kids, answering the phones as he tries not to constantly check his own.

Cas had texted him when he arrived, just like he promised, and has been texting him every now and then to let Dean know he’s okay. Finally, Dean’s phone rings.

“Everything is fine,” Cas says, by way of greeting. “I’m about to start heading back.”

“Cool,” Dean says. “How’d it go?”

“We can talk about it when I get home,” Cas says.  
\--

Dean tries to stay awake until Cas gets back. He downs a few cups of coffee and lies in bed, rereading _The Fellowship of the Ring._

It doesn’t quite work out as he planned. He wakes the next morning with his face pressed into the pillow, and when he groans and opens one eye, Cas is there, sitting next to him in bed, holding an open book in his hands.

Dean’s heart races a little at the sight of him, but he ignores it, closes his eye again, takes a deep breath. He throws an arm over Cas’ legs and asks him, eyes closed, “What’re you reading?”

“ _The Fellowship of the Ring,_ ” he says. “You fell asleep with it laying on your face.”

Dean grunts an acknowledgement. “Didn’t Metatron download the whole trilogy directly into your brain?”

“Yes,” Cas says, “but some things are worth experiencing again.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Dean says.

“Plus,” Cas says, “it’s an excellent Christian allegory--”

Dean scoffs. “Tolkien hated that accusation, you know,” he says. “Has this whole rant about it and everything.” He clears his throat, and, in his best impersonation of Tolkien’s voice, says, “‘I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and--’” He stops when he feels Cas twitch under his arm. He cracks his eye open again to find Cas staring at the words on the page, eyes fixed in one place as he tries not to smile. Dean shifts his arm, pushes uselessly at Cas’ thigh as Cas huffs a laugh. “Get out,” he says, fighting his own smile.

Cas knows better than to take him seriously. Instead, he sets the book down on the nightstand and slides down to lie next to Dean. Cas kisses him the rest of the way awake, eventually shifting to roll Dean onto his back, straddle his hips. Dean leans his head back as Cas moves against him, pressing kisses to his throat, but then Cas stops, pulls back. He looks down at Dean and asks, “Do you want me to stop?”

Dean is about to ask Cas what he means when he realizes what’s happening. He has his hands clenched around Cas’ biceps, fingers digging into Cas’ skin hard enough that it’d bruise if he were anyone else. He loosens his grip, mumbling an apology.

Cas shakes his head. “You weren’t hurting me,” he says.

“Okay,” Dean says. He swallows and says, “No, don’t stop.” After a moment’s hesitation, he adds, “Do you know what I’m feeling?”

Cas squints down at him and _hmm_ s thoughtfully. “You’re nervous,” he says. “But--” one side of his mouth quirks up-- “you’re also having a good time.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, huffing a laugh. “I am.”

Cas leans back down, presses kisses along Dean’s jaw as Dean pushes up against him. After a minute, Cas says, breathlessly, “Do you know what I’m feeling?”

“Mmm,” Dean says, pulling Cas down into a kiss. “I figure you’re having a pretty good time, too.”

“I am,” Cas says, smiling.

\--

Dean figures Cas probably isn’t hungry, either, if he doesn’t need sleep right now, but Cas says yes when Dean offers him breakfast.

It’s still too early for anyone else to be up, so Cas sits alone at the kitchen table, picking up where he left off in _The Fellowship of the Ring,_ as Dean puts a pan on the stove, pulls out eggs and sausage, english muffins and sharp cheddar.

Dean is halfway through laying the sausage in the pan before he asks, “So, how’d it go?”

Dean doesn’t turn around, but he can hear Cas bookmarking his place and setting the book on the table. “They made me an offer,” Cas says.

“Oh yeah?” Dean asks.

“Their feelings towards me have...changed,” Cas says carefully.

“Third apocalypse-stopping is the charm?” Dean says lightly.

Cas chuckles quietly. “Surely it’s been more than three,” he says.

“It sure feels like it,” Dean says. “I dunno, does it have to be of biblical proportions to qualify as an apocalypse?”

“I’d be happy to help plead our case,” Cas says.

“If anyone could get heaven back on our side, it’d be you.”

“I appreciate your faith,” Cas says, and Dean smiles as he pulls out a bowl, starts cracking the eggs. After a moment, Cas continues, “They’re...pleased. With this peace we’ve had these past few months. They told me--” He pauses, drums his fingers against the table. “They said I could make it last. They told me they could...fix me. And more. That they could twine their grace with mine, give me the power to stop anything else that may threaten heaven and Earth in the coming years.”

A chill runs down Dean’s spine. He botches the next egg he tries to crack, broken yolk and pieces of shell falling into the bowl. “Wow,” he says, staring down at the half-finished breakfast. “They uh. Must really trust you.”

Cas doesn’t respond right away. Dean can feel the weight of his gaze in the silence, but he can’t seem to make himself turn around. Finally, he hears Cas shift, slide off his seat and walk over to stand next to him.

“I don’t suspect trust had anything to do with it,” Cas says quietly. “Not respect, either. Certainly not love.” He touches his fingers to Dean’s wrist. Dean lets go of the bowl, lets Cas slide it towards himself. In his peripheral vision, Dean can see him looking down at the eggs, considering. “Begrudging pragmatism, perhaps.”

“Oh,” Dean says, tapping his knuckles against the counter. “So, uh. What’re you gonna tell them?”

“I already gave them my answer,” Cas says.

Dean looks up sharply but stops, mouth half open, when he finds Cas looking at him calmly, smiling softly. He snaps his jaw shut, swallows, tries again. “Oh yeah?” he manages. “What did you say?”

Cas looks back down at the bowl. He sticks his fingers into the mess of eggs, carefully fishing out pieces of shell one by one. Still smiling, he says, “I told them I’d rather do things the hard way.”

\--

A few weeks later, they sit together in the Impala, another hunt over and done.

“Ready to head home?” Dean asks, turning the key in the ignition.

“Mmm,” Cas says, settling further into the passenger seat.

Dean looks over at him as he sits with his head leaning against the window, eyes closed. Warmth spreads through his chest, and he smiles, tapping his foot against the floor, his fingers against the wheel.

“Hey, you know, uh,” Dean says, face flushed, heart racing. He clears his throat and tries again. “You know I, um--”

Cas opens his eyes. He sits up slightly, stretches his hand across the seat, palm up. Dean takes it, laces their fingers together.

Cas smiles over at him. He says, “Yeah. I know.”

**Author's Note:**

> if you're so inclined, a rebloggable version of this is [here](https://spncanonbigbang.tumblr.com/post/163113059566/build-a-home)!


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